Homemade almond milk

Allow me to be crass for just a moment, please. I try to keep this blog family-friendly, but today, I just have to tell you that sometimes, a girl needs nuts. Yes, that’s right; there are just those times where nothing sounds more delicious than a shot of fresh, creamy nut milk. You could pay for someone else’s nut milk, but why would you do that when you can make your own at home? Sure, it takes a little manual labor, but it’s so worth it. All you need is a blender, a nut milk sack, er, bag, and some almonds, agave, and vanilla. Not only is it cheaper, but you get to experience the joy of squeezing the nut milk straight from the nut milk sack, freeing the sweet, velvety liquid from the rich nut meat left behind. When you’re done, you can remove the nut meat from the sack and save it for later uses as you enjoy your entire batch of fresh-squeezed nut milk in everything from cereal to baked goods. You can also whisk just a dab of nut milk into the nut meat and voilà! You’ve just made nut cream, a wonderful topping to drizzle on scones, pound cake, or fresh fruit. Ladies, there are so many ways to enjoy nuts and their tasty contents. As with this metaphor, you are only limited by your imagination!

1 cup raw almonds
3 Tbsp agave nectar (or to taste)
1 tsp vanilla extract

Soak the almonds in plenty of (filtered) water for 8 hours or overnight.



The next day, they’ll be swimming in a murky stew of enzyme inhibitors. Drain the almonds and rinse them well.



Place the almonds in a high-speed blender with 4 cups of cold (filtered) water. My Vitamix rocks! As you can see, some of the nut skin came off my almonds when I rinsed them, but it makes no difference.



Cover and blend into a frosty nut-blizzard! It’ll take a good minute or two to get smooth.



Pour the nut milk into a large bowl through a nut milk bag. I got mine here—it was cheap and shipping was free! If you don’t have a nut milk bag, you can use a fine sieve, just be prepared for it to take quite awhile to strain.



Squeeze and wring that nut milk bag – be gentle, but not too gentle – until all the milk is extracted, and you’re left with nothing but nut meat inside. (Alternatively, use a large spoon to help force the the nut milk through a fine sieve.) Transfer the nut meat to a small container to use in other treats—you can dry it out in the oven to turn it into almond meal/flour, or you can just add it to cookie dough or cake batter as-is. You can also stir it into oatmeal, blend it into smoothies, or (my favorite) top with a splash of honey or agave and eat with a spoon. Mmm, who doesn't love a nice big hunk of nut meat?!



Pour the nut milk from the bowl back into the (rinsed) blender. Add the agave and vanilla, and cover and blend for several seconds, until incorporated. Transfer the fresh ‘n frothy nut milk to a container and refrigerate for up to one week.

I love using it in recipes, eating it with cereal, and simply guzzling a tall, cold glass of it at my kitchen counter. Every mouthful is such a creamy treat, you wouldn't dream of not swallowing it all down! Make sure to share your nut milk with friends, too. If they like it, offer to let them try your nut meat as well, or to show them the perfect technique for massaging the nut milk from the sack. If the men in your life are squeamish about drinking nut milk, just tell them that real men eat nuts. This is simply too good to keep to yourself, people. Nut milk: all-natural, nutritious, and delicious.

Ok ok, I’m done! But truly...that joke will never get old.



Yield: about 1 quart. Per 1-cup serving: I’m not sure! There is no good way to calculate how many calories and fat/protein grams are left behind in the nut meat. If commercial almond milk is any indication, though, you can estimate that 1 cup will have roughly 40-50 calories and 3-4 grams of fat.

Use your nut milk or nut meat in…
Overnight steel-cut oatmeal
Rotini with walnut sauce
Cherry almond muffins

Almost Vegan random factoids

I’ve been tagged! Kati shared seven random facts about herself and nominated me to do the same. I don't talk too much about myself on this blog – it's all about the food, baby – so I thought, why not? Here goes nothin'...

1.) I have a Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics from the University of Kansas (KU), which I earned in three years. Though I’ve lost some of my foreign language skills since graduating (in 2006), I can still say I am comfortably fluent in Spanish, am proficient in French and Latin, can read and understand Italian and Portuguese, and know bits and pieces of various other languages such as German, Dutch, Romanian, Turkish, Japanese, etc. (Perhaps now you can see why my romp across Europe was such a life-dream-fulfillment for me!)

2.) As you may know, I’m a marathon runner. I’ve completed two so far, with times of 4:54:59 and 4:38:26 (in other words, pretty slow!). I run other distances as well (my best half marathon time is 2:15:33), but the marathon is my bread and (vegan) butter. This year, I’ve got half marathons scheduled in late March and early June, and I’ll run my third full marathon in October (hopefully sub-4:30).


Post-marathon #2 (October 2009)

3.) I’m a music freak, with a hundred or two concerts under my belt and a good 40 gigs of music on my hard drive. As far as genres go, I’m primarily into metal ( \m/ ), with dashes of industrial, goth, punk, and classical. I love road-tripping with friends to see shows. For example, among the 11 Nine Inch Nails (my all-time favorite artist) shows I’ve been to, I’ve seen them in Dallas, Denver, Chicago, Oklahoma City, St. Louis, Columbia, Wichita, and (of course) Kansas City.

4.) Speaking of being a metalhead, I’ve had my hair every color in the rainbow (and then some), though I quit dyeing it near the end of college. Around that same time I took out my septum (nose) piercing I’d had since high school. I finally removed my tongue ring just the year before last. My two-hole industrial and one cartilage piercing eventually rejected, but I still have all of my other 12 earrings (8 earlobe, 1 vertical cartilage, 1 tragus, 1 anti-tragus, and 1 rook), though I also downsized all my lobe piercings after college, from up-to-4-gauge rings to dainty little studs. I’m still hardcore on the inside, though!


Circa summer 2005

5.) I’m very into reading and writing (which is probably no surprise, now that you know I’m a linguist; see #1). My obsession with reading goes way back—as I just related to Kati recently, I was the elementary-schooler who read 365 books one summer, the sixth-grader who read 23,000 minutes that year instead of just the 1,000 required; the kid who voluntarily set her alarm for 5:15am on weekdays so she could fit in an hour and a half of reading before school. Nowadays, I don’t have nearly as much time to read as I'd like, but my favorite reads are classical and Russian literature, and historical and/or scientific nonfiction. As for writing, besides this blog, I’m an avid diary-keeper and an amateur poet. I’ve dreamed since first grade of being a published writer someday.

6.) I’ve never really talked about my "food journey" on here because it’s quite complex, as well as personal. But to summarize, I’ll say that I pretty much didn’t eat for many years of my life, and when I did eat, I subsisted on Ramen noodles, pizza with the cheese peeled off, and spaghetti marinara. No one has ever found a satisfactory explanation for this, least of all me. As a child and young adult, I was somehow simply averse to food in general. As a result, I was malnourished enough by mid-high-school to raise concern, and was put on a constellation of medications that made me not just gain weight, but blow up like a balloon. Suddenly, after having been scrawny my whole life, I found myself a fat and unhealthy 18-year-old. This is when I dived headfirst into nutrition, cooking, and exercise, losing 45 lbs in 7 months and forever altering my interests, tastes, body, habits, and attitudes. Vegetarianism followed, and not long after that, I developed my current "almost vegan" routine/philosophy. I’ve never looked back.

7.) I’ll conclude with some small, random/silly facts about myself...I am an inexplicably thirsty person, and typically drink 120-130 oz. of water per day. I have some strange phobias—the ocean at night, pictures/footage of underwater shipwrecks, index toes, optic nerves, dead trees sticking out of water, the sound of fingernails rubbing on terrycloth, the windmills in central Kansas, the word "enterprise," et al. I had absolutely beyond-atrocious eyesight (-12.5) my whole life, until I finally had Lasik two years ago. I have a smattering of freckles on my upper chest which, if you play connect-the-dots, form the Big Dipper. I have an uncanny memory in general, but especially when it comes to birthdays. I get inordinately delighted at the sight of geese. I have the cutest bike in the world.


Coco, my pride and joy!

Tag, you’re it!
Hillary
Hannah
Matt
Aimee

Black olive tapenade

Even though last entry’s whole grain rosemary-garlic bread is absolutely mouthwateringly perfect all on its own, it’s also great with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, or a savory dip. This black olive tapenade, also courtesy of Urban Vegan, makes a particularly excellent pairing with that bread or any other.

1 cup pitted black olives
3 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
2 1/2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
2 Tbsp capers, rinsed
2 large garlic cloves, peeled
1 tsp miso paste
1/2 tsp dried thyme
Freshly ground black pepper

Put all ingredients in a food processor (or Vitamix).



Pulse until almost smooth, then transfer to a small container. That’s it!



Sodium-watchers beware, this tapenade is salt-tastic! But it’s SO good; full-flavored, garlicky, and satisfying. Whether you eat it on whole grain bread, beer bread, flatbread, pita chips, crackers, or even raw veggies, I know you’ll love it.



Yield: 4 servings. Per 1/4 cup: 135 calories, 13.7g fat (2g sat), 3.8g carbs, 1g fiber, .6g protein.

If you like this, you might also like…
Curry lentil crackers w/spinach-avocado dip
Tuscan white bean dip
Indian spice hummus

Whole grain rosemary-olive bread

I don’t really make New Year’s resolutions. When I decide I want to do something, I just do it, whether it’s January or July. That said, I do think it can be healthy to look ahead at the coming year as a whole and think of some things you’d like to accomplish. A goal I loosely decided upon this year is to conquer my "fear" of yeast breads. It’s not that I’m literally scared to make them; in fact, I’m not even really afraid that I’ll mess them up. It’s just the time factor. It feels like they take for.ev.er, and when it comes to baked goods, I’m more of an instant gratification type of girl (many a burned finger or tongue can attest to this). I did make pizza dough at home once, but other than that, I’ve avoided anything yeasted.

The time had come for that to change. As I already mentioned, I love the Urban Vegan’s still-newish cookbook, and I chose one of Dynise’s recipes to get me on the yeast-bread-bandwagon. With the necessary advanced planning, it was just as easy as she promised, and even more delicious than I could have imagined.

3 Tbsp olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 small onion, minced
3-4 cups whole grain flour
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 cup pitted black olives
3 Tbsp dried rosemary, crushed
2 tsp yeast
1-1 1/2 cups warm water

In a small pan, heat 1 Tbsp of the olive oil over medium heat. Sauté the garlic and onion until soft, about 5 minutes. Let cool.



Finely chop the olives and set aside with the onion and garlic mixture.



In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine 3 cups flour (I used 1 cup spelt flour and 2 cups whole wheat pastry flour) with the salt, olives, sautéed onion and garlic, and rosemary.



Stir in the yeast, then add the water (I used just over a cup to start with; you may need more). Add more flour as needed, in 1/4 cup increments (I only needed just over 1/4 cup, but this can vary greatly). Knead until smooth, using the mixer’s bread hook. Spray the dough lightly with cooking spray and cover the bowl with plastic wrap.



Let rise in a warm place until doubled in size, about 1 hour.



Punch down the dough, then knead on a Silpat or a floured surface for about 5 minutes. Form into a boule (a round loaf) and place on a greased cookie sheet.



Let rise for half an hour. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Brush the loaf with the remaining 2 Tbsp olive oil. I tried slicing an X in the top of my bread, like those fancy artisan loaves in the store, and it sort-of worked.



Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, or until the loaf is browned and sounds hollow when tapped. Cool completely (seriously, don’t skimp) on a wire rack before slicing.



I am not kidding, this stuff is unbelievable! The savory duet of onion and garlic provides a beautiful accompaniment to the depth and heartiness of the yeast and rosemary. There are lots of olives in there, yet the bread has no briny or overly salty taste—just great olive flavor. In fact, I sneakily fed pieces to two avowed olive-haters, and both of them LOVED it (one even called it the best bread he’s ever tasted!). If I, a yeast bread novice, can turn out something as stupendous as this, I can only dream of what mouthwatering breads I’ll bake in the future.



Yield: 1 loaf, 16 large slices. Per slice: 130 calories, 3.7g fat (trace sat), 22.2g carbs, 4g fiber, 3.3g protein.

If you like this, you might also like...
Tuscan white bean dip
Whole wheat beer bread
Indian spice hummus

December-January leftovers

Every year, my friends and I throw a huge New Year’s Eve bash, and I’m in charge of the food. This year, for the sweets, I made chocolate chunk peanut butter blondies and two cupcakes from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World: rum raisin (top) and margarita lime (bottom right). All were well-loved!



This is a random Sunday night dinner I made for me and Matt—a Tex-Mex chili from Madhur Jaffrey’s World Vegetarian, with from-scratch cornbread.



Chocolate chip cookie dough cupcakes from Love and Olive Oil—homemade vegan cookie dough is rolled into balls and suspended in a vanilla cupcake batter, and is whipped right into the vegan buttercream icing. Dangerously decadent!



Here are some sesame balls that Matt and I shared at Po’s...



...and the curry noodles I ate with them.



This is a tweak on the dulce de leche shortbread bars from Baking Bites’ cookbook.



Rachel and I had a weeknight talkfest at JP Wine Bar, where we noshed on hummus and pita alongside flights of red wine.



I made mini loaves of my peanut butter banana bread, but split the batter in two parts. I made four loaves of peanut butter with chocolate chips, four loaves of chocolate with peanut butter chips, and the last loaf, seen here in the middle, with the last bits of both batters swirled together.



This stuff is always a hit!



If you like this, you might also like...
Random 2009 leftover madness
August leftovers
July leftovers